


Not Your Fault

by TheDarkChocolateLord



Category: Keeper of the Lost Cities Series - Shannon Messenger
Genre: Angst, Blood, Canon Compliant, Character Death, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Injury, Nightmares, No beta we die like Kenric, Oneshot, Oralie and Bronte are best friends and have sleepovers and you can't prove me wrong, Oralie's been through some messed up stuff, Violence (slightly more than canon levels), well humor if you look past all the angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-03
Updated: 2020-12-03
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:27:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27855929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDarkChocolateLord/pseuds/TheDarkChocolateLord
Summary: Oralie has a nightmare about Lumenaria. Bronte is a good friend.
Relationships: Councillor Bronte & Councillor Oralie (Keeper of the Lost Cities)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 13





	Not Your Fault

**Author's Note:**

> I could probably lay off the angst.  
> I guess I'm not going to.

The castle walls glew as Oralie raced through the trembling halls, heart pounding as the ground pulsed beneath her feet.  _ The next door is the exit, _ she told herself,  _ the next one, the next one,  _ but when she raced through the doorway she saw—

"Sophie!"

The blond girl was collapsed in the corner of the room, dark red blood drenching her pale tunic, shallow cuts scattered across her face and arms. Sophie's breathing was shallow and panicked, like she was inhaling sand instead of air.

"We can get you out— _ stay _ —don't die, please don't die—" Oralie put her hands on Sophie's chest, trying to stop the bleeding, but the red was slipping through her fingers, racing across the tunic like an ink spill spreading through tissue paper. Tears ran down her face, turning her vision into a watery blur.

Sophie looked her in the eye. "It was you," she rasped, disgust and anger emanating from her hands. "It was always you."

"Sophie—" Oralie opened her mouth, but no words came out, like her voice had been ripped from her throat.

"You couldn't protect your own daughter from the human world. Couldn't protect her from the Council. Can't protect her from this. You're not my mother, you never were my friend, never were my ally. How many other times is someone going to die to save you? Did those goblins down in the dungeons deserve to die? Did Kenric? Do I?"

"Sophie,  _ please,  _ stay—" Oralie tried, but when she touched one of Sophie's hands it was cold, lifeless, empty, emotionless—she was gone.

And yet her voice echoed through the halls.  _ It was you. It was always you.  _ The world flashed neon orange, and Oralie saw Kenric, tackling Fintan away from her as the two of them erupted into flames, saw Mr. Forkle's lifeless body in the halls of Lumenaria—the room spun and she saw Bronte shake his head and walk away, bitter tendrils of disappointment wafting through the air— _ you're not strong enough, you'll never be strong enough— _

" _ Oralie!" _

Bronte's voice tore through the air. "It's a nightmare, wake up, it's not real."

Her eyes blinked open. 

Bronte was standing at the edge of her bed, his dark pajamas almost making him blend in with the dim room. Dark furniture, dark curtains, her pink blanket barely distinguishable—she was in his house. They'd been having a sleepover. 

"Where were you?" Bronte continued, his voice softening as he looked her in the eye. "I heard you saying something about Sophie—"

"Lumenaria," Oralie whispered, shifting over, and Bronte sat down on the edge of her bed. He clapped his hands twice, and the room flooded with light. "Sophie–she—I—she said it was all my fault. And Kenric was gone and you were running away, and maybe she was right—" She gasped for air, able to feel her heartbeat in her chest, her neck, her fingertips. 

"That's not true and you know it," Bronte assured her.

"But who knows if she thinks so or not? If I hadn't asked the goblins to go to the dungeons—" Tears streaked down her face, adding to the ones from earlier—so that part of the dream had been real. 

"I'm going to stop you right there before you start blaming yourself for global warming, the Neverseen, and the door to my closet that won't quite close right." Bronte told her. "It's not your fault. It's never been your fault."

Oralie took a shaky breath, trying to let the words sink in. "Sophie—"

"Sophie forgave me for inflicting on her and being unfair to her for the first year of her life in the Lost Cities. It's going to take her time, but I guarantee you, she doesn't think that what happened in Lumenaria was your fault. And neither do I." 

Her breathing was still panicked, her heart still racing, but every breath came a little more easily than the last, every heartbeat softened until she could no longer feel it in her fingertips. 

_ She doesn't think that what happened in Lumenaria was your fault. And neither do I. _

Still, when she closed her eyes the same images still flashed through her mind—the crumbling walls of Lumenaria, Sophie's tiny body in the glowing room, Gethen's sword slick with blood—

"I can't go back to sleep," she whispered.

"I've been there," Bronte assured her. He clapped his hands twice; the lights in the room sparked on. "All right, we're making mallowmelt. Or tea. Or something. I wasn't sleeping well anyway."

"Tea sounds great. I'm not sure I'm awake enough to make mallowmelt without it being an utter disaster."

"That reminds me of the time Zarina and I were making cookies and we ended up setting off the fire alarm. To be fair, I was not the one who suggested zapping the cookies instead of baking them."

"You two did  _ what _ ?" Oralie gasped. "I haven't heard that one yet."

Bronte sighed. "It all started during the meet-the-new-Councillor sleepover when she joined…"

The two of them sit at his kitchen table with mugs of herbal tea, swapping crazy stories about everything from their Foxfire days to Council work to stuffed animals. Oralie's nightmares fade, the two of them laugh, and maybe, just for this moment, she's getting closer to being okay.

  
  



End file.
